East Orchard is a small village in the rural Blackmore Vale

Blackmore Vale

The Blackmore Vale is a vale, or wide valley, in north Dorset, and to a lesser extent south Somerset and southwest Wiltshire in southern England. The vale is part of the Stour valley...

 area of north Dorset

Dorset

Dorset , is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The county town is Dorchester which is situated in the south. The Hampshire towns of Bournemouth and Christchurch joined the county with the reorganisation of local government in 1974...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

, adjacent to West Orchard

West Orchard

West Orchard is a small village in the rural Blackmore Vale area of north Dorset, England, adjacent to East Orchard, from which it is separated by a stream, and situated half way between Shaftesbury and Sturminster Newton. The village has a population of 77 .- External links :*...

, from which it is separated by a stream, and half way between Shaftesbury

Shaftesbury

Shaftesbury is a town in Dorset, England, situated on the A30 road near the Wiltshire border 20 miles west of Salisbury. The town is built 718 feet above sea level on the side of a chalk and greensand hill, which is part of Cranborne Chase, the only significant hilltop settlement in Dorset...

 and Sturminster Newton

Sturminster Newton

Sturminster Newton, known to locals as Stur, is a town in the Blackmore Vale area of Dorset, England. It is situated on a low limestone ridge in a meander of the River Stour. The town is at the centre of a large dairy agriculture region, around which the town's economy is built...

. The village has a population

Population

A population is all the organisms that both belong to the same group or species and live in the same geographical area. The area that is used to define a sexual population is such that inter-breeding is possible between any pair within the area and more probable than cross-breeding with individuals...

of 127 (2001).

East Orchard was listed in Domesday Book in 1086 (Folio 84r Great Domesday Book), where it was named as Horcerd. Inhabitants included Bolla the priest, Durand the carpenter, Godwine the huntsman, Hugh fitzGrip the sheriff and King Willam I (William the Conqueror) as landholder.

External links

• Census data

http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documentsonline/details-result.asp?Edoc_Id=7573694&queryType=1&resultcount=1